Update at 12:52 p.m.: Nickey Van Exel murdered his best friend because that friend "was going to be a snitch," prosecutor Elaine Evans said in an opening statement this morning.

"Bradley Eyo was going to do the right thing," Evans said.

As part of a guilty plea in connection with May 2010 Houston aggravated robberies he committed with Van Exel, Eyo was likely going to implicate Van Exel, prosecutors said. Van Exel knew it and that's why he killed his long-time friend and neighbor ten days before the Houston sentencing hearing, Evans said.

Defense attorney Paul Johnson countered that the shooting was a tragic accident and that his client is guilty of the lesser charge of manslaughter.

"There was no reason, no motive," Johnson said. "This case was an accident."

He acknowledged that his client made a series of bad decisions after the shooting. But he said even Dallas police believed the case warranted a manslaughter charge, which is what they filed against Van Exel.

Prosecutors indicted him months later on the more serious capital murder charge.

Original post at 8:28 a.m.: Testimony is expected to begin this morning in the capital murder trial of the son of former Dallas Mavericks player Nick Van Exel.

Nickey Van Exel, 22, is accused of fatally shooting his long-time friend Bradley Eyo in the chest with a shotgun at Van Exel's Garland home in December 2010. According to police, Van Exel later confessed to the shooting, saying that he didn't realize the gun was loaded.

Van Exel, who faces up to life in prison, told police that after shooting his 23-year-old friend, he wrapped him in plastic, dragged him to his garage and loaded him into the back of his Chevrolet sport utility vehicle, according to police documents.

Authorities believe Van Exel drove his friend's body over to an area just west of Lake Ray Hubbard and dumped the body. He went back home and cleaned his bedroom and stairs and then left again, Van Exel later told police, this time to get rid of the gun in a North Dallas creek.

Though he was initially arrested days after the shooting on a capital murder charge, Van Exel was indicted in January 2011 on the lesser charge of manslaughter.

But later in 2011, court records show Van Exel was indicted again, this time on a charge of capital murder. The indictment reads that he shot his friend, "in the course of committing and attempting to commit the offense of retaliation."

It's unclear exactly what prosecutors believe Van Exel was retaliating for, but a court proceeding outside the presence of the jury late Monday afternoon offered some hints.

During the hearing, prosecutors called a witness who said Eyo pleaded guilty to aggravated robbery charges in Harris County in 2010. As part of his plea, Eyo was to tell prosecutors there about his crimes. Doing so apparently could have included implicating Van Exel.

The witness who testified Monday said he was with Eyo in November 2010, when Eyo called Van Exel to assure him that he would not get him in any trouble. Van Exel, the witness said, was mostly silent.

Van Exel's father played 13 seasons in the NBA, including 1 1/2 seasons with the Mavericks.